 Hello and welcome to the drum history podcast. I'm your host Bart van der Zee and today I am joined by Mr Alfonso Adonolfi of Boom Theory. Al welcome to the podcast. Bart, nice to be here and thank you for having me. It is my pleasure. I've enjoyed getting to know you over the last couple months we've been talking about different things and and it's it's cool to learn more about your brand because I wasn't aware of all the incredible accomplishments you've had until our mutual friend Lucas O'Connor or Lucas Von Gretch as as he's known online Told me about you and said you'd be a great guest. So Lucas worked with you before correct? Lucas was my production manager for a short period of time and He's one of the most incredible kids I ever met and I love them dearly. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah And he's he's a member of the Gretch family and does a great job basically continuing on their their legacy and all that good stuff So yeah, great friend of the show. So All right, Al This is very interesting. I think because we're talking about electronic drums. We're talking about acoustically formatted Electronic drums, which there's a lot of things that that you your brain You've got a very interesting brain that works with this stuff as you said you like you do visceral engineering, which is I Think you said you are the idiot savant of electro percussion, which is a whenever anybody asked me to scribe That's it. I am the idiot savant of electro percussion and visceral engineering is a term that I believe I coined many years ago and I don't have a formal education I'm also ADD and dyslexic. So I have a difficult time Getting anything done and usually the only way I achieve anything is I have to bash it first and then fix it So if I can hold it in my hands, I can figure out how to make it work Yeah, very interesting. It's kind of inspirational in a way because I think electronics Engineering it's like Daunting kind of I mean I look at things like oh god, I can't do that I don't know anything about that but a guy like you who just comes in and like like no, I can do this I love that. I think it's really cool and powerful to say like no I can figure it out and people can look at your example and go, you know Well, he did it. Maybe I can do it and that opens up for the next generation too well, it's I never considered myself any great genius at this, but it was more necessity The company started in 89. I was doing industrial soundtracks for Boeing and I was using the little Roland flying triangles Roland was, you know, a very powerful electric drum company even back then and I had to go back into the studio and step right all the dynamic parts and I said this is ridiculous I can make something better and it took me two years and about 30 grand of Unsecured credit card loans and and I figured out how to make an insert which I've always referred to as Almost intelligent in its ability to decide, you know to decipher what is an airborne sympathetic vibration and what is actual impact and and I think that's the the misconception always was that space muffins were drum stuffed with foam but No, you take a drum set stuff with foam on stage and expose it to high decibels and it's playing itself and Yeah, I was able to figure out how to make that work So let's just like completely back up and my goal with this is to like again, you have such an accomplished background with all this stuff I just want to like Make sure people realize kind of the importance of your contributions and your patents and all that stuff so let's go back to the very beginning of boom theory and there's the The space muffins and all that kind of stuff But like as we're starting to hear your background is your introduction to electronic drums Which you sort of did before with working with the Roland stuff What was happening at the time in the landscape of electronic drums that that made you kind of want to change this? Well, you had it started of course with Dave Simmons and Dave made this incredible product Which to this day is amazing And then my first introduction was the Tomatek stars Which are my favorite electronic drum pads and then I moved to D drum and Magnuson and yet I were back in Connecticut And I had the first D drum studio module that I brought out here And I was totally hooked on electronics and I love the idea of playing on a on a natural head but it was killing my wrists and elbows and and then after the Roland episode at the Boeing Studios I said, that's it and that was pretty much the landscape that everything was a pad and I said I'm going to build an electric drum and and that was my first pursuit And like I said, it took me about two almost two and a half years and 30 grand of Experimenting and I finally came up with with a great design and and the first supporter and and booster of boom theory was mr Michael Shreve and Michael is a dear friend and I love him very much and Michael is such an electronics drum expert. He's been playing electronic drums I mean even before I even bought a set of drums And uh, Michael came into the studio where I was working on it and he said Make me a set and I made him a set and uh It's it's such a We the the way the company was capitalized was because they started writing articles about about the space muffins in in local papers and entrepreneurial sort of Focuses on what I was doing the next thing I knew Norm Waite who was the co-founder of gateway computers contacted me through one of his uh, his um employees and Sent a lear jet to pick up Michael and I flew us out to Dakota dunes and gave me two and a half million bucks to start the company So you're on a lear jet with the drummer from Santana Thanks to the guy from gateway computers. I mean, it's just like Wow That's a book in itself. But yeah, I came I came home with with funding for For boom theory and Michael came home with his own record label. So Geez wheeze That was a good day, man. Yeah, but I think that comes down to people want to trust like You as a person and him obviously his background and and you know that that's really cool But uh, that's great that if some people would get put in that position and not walk away with anything They would have blown it but it sounds like people you got you were trusted No, believe me his board wanted me to die. They wanted nothing to do with me at one point in the meeting after I presented the um The business plan norm said to me, what's the first thing you're gonna do? I said, I'm gonna rip up this friggin business plan and throw it in the garbage Because there's no way I'm I'm gonna be able to adhere to this and he said, well, what are you telling me? I said, I'm telling you that if I want to spend two and a half million dollars on green m&m's It's my call and you either believe I can do it or I can't and uh his gatekeeper Uh gentleman named steve selene just said no no we're not doing and It's a long story. Like I said There is a book in itself, uh That was that that was a soap opera that we went through. But yeah, it was it was one of the best days And I'll always be grateful to norm for trusting me and and uh, right in the chat Unbelievable and so people can kind of and I don't know how it evolved over time But so you can visualize it. These are acoustic you look at them from the outside the space muffins And they're acoustic drums that you look at and it's an acoustic kit that has electronics under the heads And this was not around at the time at all, right? This was no The space muffins were the first acoustically formatted electric drum. They were the first full-size acoustically formatted electric drum and um I I love beta testing as you probably know I love sending out products and letting people just beat the crap out of them and tell me what's wrong I have no ego about this stuff. I want to know what's wrong with them And my dear friend mr. Matt Cameron who was one of the first endorses of the company um Agreed to take a couple of small pads out and that was one of the most important beta tests We ever did because that's when I learned that you cannot put a Space muffin pad on the same stage where they kept playing your snare drum and expect it not to false trigger Yeah, oh kept kept builds cannons as you know, and another dear friend great um And that was some of the most important r&d I did and from that I was able um, are you familiar with scott columbus the late scott columbus from manowar? No Okay, so manowar holds the guinness records for the loudest stage volume ever I've heard that. Yes. So scott scott contacted me and he said I'm sending you my drums. I want you to trigger them. I have triggered drums for many many people But scott was the the challenge where I said, okay if I can do this So um, so I triggered scott's drums and we sent him out on the kings of metal tour through europe and uh He had had difficulties the whole time and the drums performed flawlessly and they didn't false trigger and that's when I knew I had perfected the inserts Yeah, with the loudest band on earth So can we just kind of explain that a little bit as we're at that point To trigger the drums would be meaning is he simultaneously playing them as like acoustic drums that are mic'd And also they're it's just like an aesthetic that they look like real drums He was he was he was triggering an 0.0 module, which is that's a whole other thing He triggered the 0.0 module which which we built and uh, and he was also Middying out into a d-drum Uh, I believe he was using a d-drum three with some samples on it But there were I think they had one overhead mic for the cymbals because he was using acoustic cymbals But everything was being triggered. Hmm. What year was that? Before christ was born. I'm not sure But it was like nine nine. That's probably 90 98 99 I'd have to look up the kings of metal tour, but yeah, I ran that period Now, why would someone in his position like like I guess at that point Beyond just experimenting. What is the benefit at that point of totally because I've never really heard of that Someone triggering their full kit with like a metal band like that. What's the what would you say would be the benefit at that time? Well, the problem he was having was the stage volume was so loud and that the the bleed through of the microphones Just from the guitars and everything was just coming through Uh, the monitors coming through the pa. So so it wasn't the drums were being washed out But but there was so much bleed through so he tried triggering and you also have to remember and I actually have this video tape on the on the on the facebook page and and it's scott addressing the european european drum press and uh And he never actually referred to me, but he's saying yeah Well, here's the evolution because it was not hip to play electric drums in a metal band and scott had the balls to do it and uh And the amazing thing was is that he says well, I did this and then I went to this and then I tried D drums And that was okay He goes and then I met this cat from washington and he triggered my drums and they worked flawlessly But he never actually named me, but uh, you have to understand the vibe back then it was like You're playing Electrics what the hell kind of metal drummer are you so that's been the uphill battle forever with with I feel like even now If you see someone playing traditionally like like a v-drum clearly this is electric Kit it does have a bit of a feel to it Whereas when it's a kit that looks totally natural and real and is in these, you know Beautiful shells that you have them on your website and you've got some awesome stuff with with wraps and you can customize it And it looks like real drums, but all right, so you have some patents along the way So so as you created those patents What was that process like because I have looked at it I had an idea for a product years ago and I was like maybe I asked I asked a friend who's an ip attorney That's not a pleasant easy fun experience to get a patent. I mean, what was that the story of that? you patents like we spoke about this earlier and it's like I said a A patent is only as good as your ability to defend it and you have to have some deep pockets. Yeah, and uh I had The japanese companies come in in 1992. They came into my booth with videotape and Started videoing everything we were doing not just me, but everybody in the electronic field even lennie green from midi sims um Everybody's stuff was copied, but not copied to the point where Um where you'd have a clear infringement case But I mean if you've got a membrane touching foam touching a touching a sensor That would be a violation of my patent Or possibly somebody else's patent, but But the difference is in an acoustically formatted drum. There was no question because There were no acoustically formatted drums. There were no full-sized electric drums As a matter of fact, I'm always amazed when When you see the products that are out now and everybody's going where we have a full-size acoustic drums I don't know what an innovation, you know, I mean I mean and it was always about motor memory to me It's like why do you have to play these little drums when you have trained and honed your skill on an entire drum set? so so my desire has always been to be the um The wood-weighted keyboard equivalent of the drum world that is what I've always aspired to be I've always wanted To it's just like it feels just like the drum set and um So yeah, but uh, but you've seen the evolution since then as far as the patents go I I have uh, I've just received my 11th Utility patent on an integrated bass drum which eliminates the need to plug everything in using like a snake That goes directly out of the drum into a db 25 And speaking of the db 25 the 0.0 module was the first electronic instrument in the history of the Industry not just the drum industry any industry to use a multi-input trigger system Which it took everybody else about 10 years to figure out and copy Wow, um, I also built the first integrated rack system which Which competitors tried to duplicate but you know didn't fortunately Um, well, what is can you explain each of these a little bit like and to explain with people? I have experience with db 25s with using pro tools and studios where it would be Backier it's basically from from my perspective of like you've got rack mounted gear where instead of having You know 16 outs of microphones You'd have a deep a breakout cable like a db 25 cable that then goes One little harness goes then to the back of your converter or something, but like what do you Yeah, explain more about the less Best example. Yeah, best example would be um One of my favorite rolling modules was the td 9 Version 2 of the td 15 which I used to this day and on the back You have the db 25 input which they basically copped from the 0.0, which we put out in 1997 And uh, as you know, you have this gnarly snake system, which absolutely sucks So so what I did is I integrated the entire snake into the base drum So it's the lower left and lower right and top of the drum everything that you can plug into the back of a td 9 td Td 15 td 17 td 25 anything that's even even the elicits products that utilize a A multi pin input All you do is plug everything into the base drum and i'm using 3.5 Mini plugs because the idea that you need a quarter inch jack is absurd Yeah, I mean I mean this wire here right here is all you need to send that signal Yeah, so so basically you're plugging everything into the base drum You come out of db 25 into the back of your unit and and it's virtually wireless So that's so that's what I did now the the original incarnation to that was the integrated rack system where You had to you put your toms on a rack and then you plugged everything into strategic points on a Gibraltar rack system Which I would buy the tubing and then we would retrofit it to work and then after I Invented what we referred to as the actual mount system the ax system Which to this second I am the only manufacturer that you can mount Your rack toms on a totally electric bass drum Whack a baseball bat on your toms and you won't trigger either tom or the bass drum That's crazy. This I know so this is the kind of stuff that I've been doing for 30 plus years but I've flown under the radar and um I've made most of my sales to churches and by triggering other people's drums like some people You don't talk about that you triggered their drums because they have a very very exclusive contract and They're not going to lose their ride And some people don't care like scott didn't care or um You know when I did tommy lee's Bass drum he didn't care. That's interesting though. So I mean but like without we're not asking any names or anything But that's interesting to know that there are people out there in the world who are like famous drummers playing You know x y and z brands, but what you're actually hearing Through the speakers are triggered samples From someone like you yeah the the x series, which is another one of my patents which I patented back in the 90s was the world's first fully acoustic and electric drum I would embed the sensors into the shell wall And uh, and I did that because we were in the studio And I was watching them trying to trigger electric sounds off of tape You know, they they roll the two inch tape and try and trigger sound like oh That doesn't seem right. So I took a I took a little while And I figured out how to embed the sensors So you would be able to record in a total analog and digital domain simultaneously you would have Total dynamics total performance data and in post production You could go back and either blend and electric and acoustic sound or totally eliminate the acoustic sound And and substitute it With the electric and you'd have total performance data which d drum then tried to do with their highbred And you know, I was doing that 30 years ago. So again another patent which um They did it differently, of course, but the whole vibe and the whole idea And uh, my dear friend, mr. Brian van Tassel has a whole demo on youtube of his X series and how well they work and um Sure, and every now and then I'll get somebody he'll say yeah build me an x series Which is a fully acoustic kit that uh that triggers simultaneously That's so that's the like, um I guess that's like the the mac daddy series though where you can get the boat best of both world And you can you can play your drums in the room But you're also then simultaneously running out and getting that sound to the board that you can then enhance I imagine people sometimes with the x series that you have would do a little bit of both Where they'd maybe mic it and blend a sample in with The the trigger if they're playing in a live situation, is it like in a live situation And and most of the people that are that have bought x series are in Like casino cover bands and all of a sudden you're just going to drop out the acoustic sounds and you need your 808 Drum set to to do some you know some hip-hop stuff or you need this jazz fusion sound where you can blend it together But um, yeah, that's that's what the x series is all about but it was actually a studio application That brought me to do that and then that brought that yielded the bridge deck Which is now starting to be covered or copied I should say and the bridge deck is the first Graduated layered snare or drum And it started out totally as a As an electronic experiment to give myself a little more meat On the on the shell so I could embed the sensor properly because the snare of course is taking The hardest hits and it turned out to be an incredible acoustic drum um Yeah, I mean explain the bridge deck a little bit more though So like what when someone buys it it so it's an acoustic It's the similar to the x series you have though where it's an acoustic snare that also Is triggered has has but like what makes it Or explain well that the the design started out totally electric But it ends up that now I just build the bridge deck as an acoustic drum I can also incorporate the electronics into it but the bridge deck the bridge deck started out We have to step I'll explain I love thin shell drums and the way I explain this is if you take a cardboard Let's say you have a six inch diameter cardboard tube And you have an industrial size, which is a quarter inch wall really thick and you tap on it It's going to go dink dink dink But if you take the same diameter tube And it's only a 16th of an inch like a paper towel roll and you go dink dink dink It goes boom boom boom because those walls can resonate So so I wanted to build a drum now originally I wanted to build it because I just wanted more meat To put to embed the sensor and because I build thin shell drums But what happened was is I would do layering on So I would start out with say 16 play on top and then Gradually go down to an eight ply then a five ply and then 10 ply at the bottom And what I was getting was all the pop and focus you would expect from a thick shell or a dense shell And all the resonance and tone of a thin shell drum So it I didn't begin it that way that wasn't the intention But it turned out to be a great sounding acoustic drum As is the one I'm experimenting with right now, which is the ice series, which is uh the incremental konga emulation which Um, I'm the response to this drum has been overwhelming and it's just I just I don't want to build what everybody else is building I want to I want to keep looking for new designs a new way to to make things work But but yeah that so I digress the bridge deck from that. Yeah Yeah, and I think uh It it needs to be said that like yes, you have you're extremely innovative in electronic drums You've you've doing all this cool stuff But like kind of like you know, it can't be forgotten that you're like a really Uh, well-established drum builder In general, you know what I mean like that I appreciate that and I I like to consider myself a drum builder as opposed to so many of these people that are drum Assemblers you buy a shell you put a 45 degree edge on it You put some generic stuff on and you say this is the greatest thing since light spread and they may You know, it's sad to me that innovation in this industry has has been reduced to a new finish You know, uh, and I've always referred to this as the war of the wood circles and again drum Drum tone is so subjective and I have maintained for 20 30 years that the single most important part of your Of your drum sound is your head selection And that's really what it comes down to and I could tell you a story about that at the nam show if you want to hear it, but yeah, please. I love it I think it was 2007 And we're in drum row and everybody's a sweetheart and I Well, I'll tell you who won't mind me saying brian spawn my buddy brian spawn was there I think kepp was there greg kepplinger and we had representatives from Um All the major drum companies. Um, I believe the late I think it was phil edelson I think that was his last name from yamaha was there Phil is gone But anyway, the discussion was Wood shells and everybody's well, I like the warmth of rosewood and nothing projects like babinga And this that and the other thing and they're going on and on and on i'm sitting there listening to and i'm going I'm going The most important part of anything is the drum head and they all started You know, it was very good nature and they're going what the hell do you know? You're an electric drum builder. You don't know shit and I said, okay, that's it and this had to be 2007 because washington mutual was still a bank um So I said, okay on harbour avenue. There's a washington mutual i'm going to go out and i'm going to get $5,000 In cash right now. I'm going to come back here. I said each one of you go to your boots Bring back a six and a half by 14 inch drum. I'm going to go talk to To Remo I'm going to get all the same heads and I'm going to get I was going to call cap and say cap's going to Tune every one of the drums. I said, we're all going to turn our back Anybody who can tell me which is a rosewood and which is a babinga wood and which is maple I'll give you $5,000. How many people you think took the bat? None I bet So I can barely I can just about tell the difference between a metal shell and a wood shell just barely but um I mean The in my opinion drum head Bearing edge and depth are the three most Uh critical parts of of what your drums going to sound like um There's some woods that I have to admit are really incredible. Um The maypex walnut maple shell what a beautiful sounding drum that is and mr. Paul weary of metro drums in australia has access to some of the most incredible woods I've ever heard and my favorite being turpentine Which i'm trying to get paul to send me some turpentine shells, but he's too damn busy to do it Yeah, but I the turpentine is an amazing wood. I've never even heard of turpentine. I've heard of turpentine like, you know, the like Oh The different chemical or whatever, but yeah, not the wood. No the turpentine tree. They're the average about 600 years old Um, then you've got uh Tasmanian blackwoods another favorite the jihara is a beautiful Um outer ply Go to metro drums and look at what paul makes. It's absolutely beautiful and totally Opposite of what I make I am I am a totally organic builder. I Cannot stand polycoating. I do everything with a burnt shellac finish. I want to be able to feel the grain of the wood in my hands Sure. Um, every time I see a polycoat. I always think of you know, the plastic covering on grandma's couch You know to stop the dog from peeing on it, you know, I am a totally organic builder and Uh, I I think crushed bugs make the best finish on a drum burnt shellacism and squitting That's another one. I love doing is a natural squid ink. What's that process like squid ink? Well, when my shop was in magnolia right by fisherman's terminal, have you ever seen deadliest catch? Oh, yeah Okay, so where those boats used to dock I used to go down there and I'd buy halibut and I'd buy crab and one day this guy's coming out with a With a five gallon bucket full of this disgusting looking Pouches and I said, what's that? And he said it's squitting pouches and I said I said, well What's it do? He goes, do you don't want to get it on your hands? It'll stain. It'll be terrible I said, how much you want for the bucket? He said Just give me five bucks for the bucket. You can have the squitting for free and And I gave him five bucks and I hauled it back to the shop and I started doing squitting finishes and it's almost Uh, it's almost got this violet undertone depending on the light But it's it's an amazing finish. I have heard of many things, but I've never heard of squid ink being used I've seen I remember fishing as a kid with my brother and we got some squid that we were using as bait at some shop And puncturing something. I guess it had ink on it and I remember ruining my shorts Forever as a kid and I was like, I'll never forget that But that's incredible. You don't see that kind of uh, again, it's the innovation That I think you that just kind of oozes out of what you're doing where I'm gonna see you take for granted, but You're you're you're pretty uh, uh, you're very innovative and not no that being said it leads me to the question of innovative guy like you You've got patents. You said the the you know hardest thing to do is defend your patents You have been copied quite a bit over the years Yeah, I've heard other people talk about that. Um, I remember Jason from prologix percussion who made great pads He was talking about how he just found out that they're just making identical pads in china and what do you do when you You got to shut it down What's just what's that process been like for you with with people copying your designs and stuff? You go between being flattered and enraged and um When you see some of these big companies taking your your vibe not Not 100 your idea, but something that could be questionable and making four or five hundred million dollars off it It burns your ass a little but then you go, you know what? I am so proud that what I did Was the first and and something that I mean I've had people tell me that what I did literally changed the direction of the electric drum industry and Maybe that's true and maybe it's not but It's something that I don't mind hearing and if nothing else if i'm not going to get the cash At least I get the satisfaction Of saying yeah, I I did that one right and and that's what I continue to try and do I continue to try and do it right and I don't necessarily know if um If the payday is ever going to come and at this point, I don't care I just i'm going to do this till they carry me out of the shop and I like it. It's fun Yeah, you've you have accomplished a lot and and I've had things where there's episodes i'll do where i'm like It maybe it's something that I think is a story that needs to be told. It's someone a builder or Someone who founded a business that's a great thing in the drum industry And maybe it doesn't get 50 000 views, but I think to myself. Yeah, that doesn't matter That story now lives on forever And it's just like it's important just to have that information and have that that out there There's some parallels to that where obviously with yours it's much bigger and there's Hundreds of millions of dollars, but yeah That's why what you do is watch by so many people and and I definitely appreciate it and And I think it's it's sort of cool that yeah I get to see my guts for once. So there you go No, you're you're you're I'm honored to have you as a part of it, but before we move forward I do want to I want to cover everything because you talked about the space muffins Uh, which I I think just just in general to kind of like talk about your lines There's a space muffins. I'm looking at your website bridge deck x series 0.0 Is there anything with those that like you don't think we covered yet because like let's talk about the module well for the last Five years I've been trying to do the reissue and between the pandemic the supply shortage stuff and now the inability to get processors the the micro processors that I mean I've got I know companies locally that are buying microwave ovens from Samsung Just to get the processors out of them and put them into their products because You know wow for what happened, but um The 0.0 is an amazing story in itself because there was no way the oh a company of my size and resources could have ever done it and When I tell you the names associated like when I think back of the history of the company like Paul mason from tempest was was a consultant a dear another dear friend in it But we had to get rid of paul because all we did was laugh and tell stories all day and then um Allegra, um Incredible craftsman just incredible craftsman. He came in and he was a consultant for a while then lucas and um I mean there's so many amazing people that have been Affiliated with the company, but the 0.0 module was probably the most incredible achievement of all simply because there was no way If the timing wasn't exactly right it would have happened and this happened because Insonic had had come up with the solution one chip was Remember back in the old days you used to have to take a blade and stick it in the back of your computer to get sounds And creative labs was making billions selling the sound blaster card And then insonic came up with the solution one chip Which was a chip that had 16 bit digital sounds that you could populate directly onto a board And that was that was the death blow for creative unless they either came up with a competitive product Or they did a hostile takeover and of insonic and that's exactly what they did And at the time another dear friend mr. Joel brazy who's one of the most incredible sound engineers and um Just brilliant guy um He was working for insonic and he called me up and he said you still want to do a sound module And I said yeah, why and he said they're about to shit can The entire multimedia or the entire musical division of insonic They're going to go all multimedia creative labs is taking over said and I said, okay. What do I do and he hooked me up Uh with mr. Andrew Weir and bryan mcglockland two incredible engineers And again, like I said, I'm the idiot savante of electro percussion I was able to articulate what I wanted and the first thing I told him is it had to trigger like a d-drum at I wanted the most Beautiful dynamic triggering possible And then I said it's got to be able to stack eight individual voices I want to be able to stack eight individual voices on each channel. I want indy ins. I want indy outs We did two 65k processors so I could actually trigger via midi faster than you could trigger directly into the module you were plugging into all these features and um Joel said, okay, and we started the module and I was able The auto chip just the auto chip alone If I had to start from scratch and just get the auto chip which I ended up using in the 0.0 and Got my own source code too. It would have cost me four million dollars now I yeah, so um, so The first thing I did was uh We took it to the nam show and we introduced it and uh, we had only had enough money left to build 105 units and And then I had to buy my partners out shortly after so we never went to the second round And it took me almost 30 years to raise the money to try it again And then the pandemic happened, but we're still working on it. I I want to put out a reissue but um, I'm doing what um What I refer to as uh It's retro tech Because every time I look at the technology of modules today It's like I talk to electric drummers all the time and I say What's important to you? And it comes down to the same thing you buy an electric drum module You gravitate to one or two sets and that's all you ever play Do you actually use the rest of this technology? I'd say maybe three percent Of the a thousand drummers I've talked to you say yeah, I need this I need that I need the sync code. I need the mapping capability It may be more now that that there's more young kids coming into Into the market and the technology, but for most part Most people just want to plug in and get a great acoustic drum sound or a great Electric drum sound for whatever they're using but um, but uh, anyway that the 0.0 Would never have I could never have done it today It I was at the right place with the right time and enough cash in my pocket and and that's uh And the other the other great innovation that came out of that module was the db 25 multi-pin input Which like again, like I said was the very first time anybody had ever done it in any portion of the industry That wasn't an invention of yours that that input that that db 25 like cable or anything that existed Yeah, db 25 is common on your uh your printer. I mean, okay. Yeah, I was making sure I was like wow That seems like you can get some money. No, I didn't I didn't invent anything So all I all I did was say if you take this and do this and this and this Then you could come out with this and that's and that's where um My visceral engineering components come in like I'll go, you know, I I don't know how to do this But if I can articulate this vision to an engineer and that's the important thing is having engineers with a musical background that are actually able to um Yeah to understand what the hell you're talking about because I I can babble on as you know, so sure well No, and I love hearing it. It sounds like you're you're I don't want to say you're in the right place at the right time a lot But it seems like you uh have been in some key points in the history of this operation where um You're just ready to accept what's happening and kind of ride the wave and I guess that's part of it and And and use your visceral engineering to you to kind of make things work for yourself And I think that's been a very successful way to do it Well, what I'm what I'm working on right now acoustically is You know the i-Series but electronically I'm I'm working on a drum head and If this works And I'm praying it's going to work and you know, I'm starting the testing within the next month or so Uh, and if this works, I will literally make every electric drum on the planet obsolete in 24 hours So Hey We're going to protect it this time Yeah You're the kind of person and I feel the same way in different sort of avenues Where you got to always be doing something you got to always be working on something that's like Trying the next thing and then waiting isn't it just I love the feeling of like um You know if you're just it's even as small as like waiting for an email to come back that might say like hey Al your patent got accepted or something just always working and moving forward and trying something And I completely get that vibe from you where you you are a doer, you know It's just exciting to do stuff like that it is and and when even the the smallest little success, I mean, it's like I say if I if constantly being pissed off could in any way be equated to goodness I'd be jesus and the opposite side of that is that I have the lowest threshold for happiness of anybody I know it takes almost nothing to excite me or make me happy Especially if it's a leggy red head, but that's a whole different That is yeah, um All right a couple more questions here for you. So basically, uh, we live in a time now where things are changing This is a crazy time in technology with artificial intelligence all that stuff Not really related to ai, but but what do you think about what's going on with? I guess it would be last year at this point about with dw Roland, I guess it was the dw e kit where it was like completely wireless Uh, where they're triggering things like that. I imagine it's bluetooth I don't want to say I'm an expert on it at all. I don't really know the the background. What's your thoughts on all that stuff? um I think the uh, I saw the video and chad wackerman genius His samples are incredible. Um, what he was doing was great When I put a bluetooth drum set on the stage with the rest of the rf frequencies up there I don't think I'd try it. Good luck. I hope it works. I'm Very very much into a directly wired system and minimizing the appearance of the wiring, but There's a there's just a lot of frequencies on that stage bluetooth Is not in my opinion while it's a great innovation the great system I don't see it as dependable enough to put on the stage, but Roland is a mighty company. Roland has some of the best engineers in the business And if Roland thinks they can do it, I I think it'd be great. I might even buy a kit if it worked, you know, but um I don't I don't see it happening right now if it was I mean the the video they put out to me was vaporware because if they had if they had a working unit Like when I first saw the dw kit that um Is it what's the german company that that bought the majority stake in dw? Is that? Yeah, I think I think so that's what I was thinking when I when I first saw that kit at the uh nam show a few years back I said well, you know congratulations dw you've finally built a set of space muffins, but um the the idea that That it was gonna they weren't even talking about the bluetooth technology back then but If they do it god bless them, man. I think it'd be I think it'd be a great innovation Again what I put a bluetooth drum set on stage not at this particular point in the technology, but then A lot of weird stuff goes on at nam, but yeah Well, that's the old like and I don't know any of the details But it's the old like you know like there would be the old things with like steve jobs and apple and what he's showing of Like an ipod it like doesn't actually work. It's not ready But uh, I mean I see that and I go man that kind of that's like the the acoustic drums that are electric I was like that's what owl did. I mean that's a space muffin basically just modernized and Attempting to be there. They're also they're also using the mesh heads Which to me is like playing on a pair of pantyhose although they have improved the uh, they haven't proved the uh The feel of the mesh, but still nothing feels like a mylar drum head um And you know, I'm a huge fan of Remote drum heads and that's what I would like to do is be able to incorporate that technology into an actual drum head. So um But Like I said, if they can do it, I want to play it I want I want to I want to see what it feels like and and maybe it will reach a point Where electric drums will receive the respect and the recognition for what they are a completely different musical instrument Just like an electric guitar is not an acoustic guitar and never the twain shall meet. Um, I mean I love acoustic drums, but I would never never give up the versatility and the ability to I mean I can't play toblas, but I can pull up an incredible set of sampled toblas on my on my Electric drum set and give you a fairly good representation. You know, but and it's fun I mean that is one of the most fun things is opening things. That's like Like my toms are set to be someone's voice and then there's a tabla over here. There's nothing more fun than that Have you ever heard the the kabuki drum set on my if you go on my facebook page all my goofy videos are there And I did I used to love doing this uh sampled kabuki set That um was part of the insonic sound library Which by the way, I am the only electric drum company on the planet that has rights To use the entire insonic sound library, which is a legendary Um library that's again, joel brazy went around the world sampling these incredible incredible percussion and and voice samples that were incorporated to the uh, wow asrx one and uh, or the asrx pro I just just amazing amazing samples. I've got I've got quite a few videos using them. So yeah that world of I used to do for my old job a lot of like for like commercials and videos and things There'd be sound design where you'd have a sound library Which you would look through and you'd be you know car buys and you would find the the car going That's not quite right car door shutting and you'd look through 600 of them That's an interesting world in itself of the act of sampling these things which is I mean just like a foley artist would use you know all these incredible access to But um, but the editing of those and and you take a sample I It's just mind boggling all the envelopes that you can screw with To make that sample what you want it to be and I have great admiration for the people that have taken the time to learn How to do that because my thimble brain cannot manage it So I just there's nothing I'm ever going to be able to do with that one No, it's pretty cool. Um, but uh, al okay, so as we get kind of closer to the end here Why don't we talk a little bit about the um, which this might not if you're listening to this Make sure you check the description for links and things like that if it's up But you've got a cool raffle coming up that you're putting together for the ukraine Drone. Yeah, let's talk about that This is one of the australian shells, which is the ozzy exotic line. It's a solid tasmanian blackwood reinforced and uh, I started this project a year ago march And I it was my intention to auction it off for relief for um, uh, ukrainian children who had been displaced and Just as a matter of clarity I have no preconceived notions Or I am totally aware of the corruption that has taken place in the ukrainian government But as I see them evolve and try and move towards democracy I I really wanted to do something not and this is not about buying arms or Or the military this is just helping displaced kids who have been bombed out of their homes So I wanted to do that and I immediately called several old friends and endorses and said would you sign this And the first person on board of course was uh, matt cameron. So matt signed the drum. Michael shreve signed it Michael de roger from heart signed it and then the most important would be the late alan white And this alan took the time he and his lovely wife gg took the time between Doctor appointments to meet me downtown seattle and he signed the drum and as far as I know This is alan's last actual Humanitarian endorsement the last signature he would have put on a drum Then of course, mr. greg gilmore who is the Founding father of grunge drumming which you know with his tenure in mother-love bone mr. Ron dunette who another good friend who volunteered to Give me the throw-off and and uh and butt for this and also signed the drum and of course cap my buddy mr. greg kepplinger signed the drum And last but not least and some people will like this and some people won't Governor j insley because this is a washington state project and governor insley also signed the drum So, uh, so we've got four rock and roll hall of famers alan whites probably last uh official signature on anything And we were going to auction it off in may but between All the tragedies uvaldi buffalo new york people just killing each other senselessly And it just sort of sucked the energy right out of it, but Um, I'm getting ready to do the auction. I will Put up on the facebook page exactly where it's going to happen and how it's going to go down And we'll we'll uh put it up for a couple of weeks in the highest bidder We'll get the drum and every penny will go to either unicef or doctors without borders and it will be specifically earmarked For uh for orphaned and um and displaced kids in the ukraine and if this works I'm going to do another drum and we're going to start helping people In the united states in africa wherever we can because drummers are really Some of the most generous people i've ever met i'm not saying that other musicians aren't But drummers really put their their ass on the line to help people and i've seen it many times Over the years so and i'm and i'm just so proud that everybody who participated in this did so Totally all you guys Yeah, definitely and there's there's some videos A video you shared with me of all most of the people signing it which was just incredible Which I will share that as well and once the auction is live I will share it on my social media So keep an eye out Be I am honored to be able to you know Help share what so many great drummers are are are participating in and you is the kind of mastermind and builder behind it Be happy to share it so everyone can keep an eye out in that And if this is if you're listening to this this is 2023 June slash july when this is happening if this is like next year just keep an eye out on The boom theory facebook page and see what else al is working on if he's going to do further auctions So you you can catch more down the road, but al is we wrap up here man? Let me The last question i'm thinking is If you had any tips or advice for someone who's similar to you where they just want to try things They are like kind of you know, they they want to get their hands dirty. They're maybe you don't have a traditional engineering background They're they want to be entrepreneurial. They want to go their own way What advice would you give for people for a young you let's say if you're telling yourself 30 35 years ago What advice would you give or if that doesn't work someone who's coming up right now? What would you tell people to kind of focus on or not do you know just that you've learned Don't take unsecured credit card loans To start your company unless you absolutely have to but don't be afraid to do it If you really believe in what you're doing because Man the interest sucks Sure That would be the first bit of advice now if if you want to do it just do it I mean we're gonna be dead soon, you know, i'm 70 years old I'm rolling into my 71st birthday and and every as soon as I turn 70. I realized that My time here is very limited and uh And so yeah, if if it's something you believe and if something you think you can do you go for it Yeah, um and don't let anybody tell you you can't do it. Just do it What not to do? You don't have enough time Uh, but let's see that I don't a lot of people ask me, you know Would You know the nam show I got thrown out of which is I tell people my finest hour What happened with that? Let's hear about that. Oh I forgot about that. All right. I had these huge crates As you know when you when you load into nam, they take all your crates off the floor and then you have to grease If you want your stuff early, you sort of grease a team stern and I shouldn't say that because I'll get shot But it's true You know you ask the guy, you know here just 20 bucks. Can you get my credit? Yeah, I will get it for you early um So I had I didn't want to put the crates Into storage because we wanted to get out of there early to watch the Super Bowl on Sunday So I the crates that my drill presses came in from taiwan were these giant three-quarter inch marine plywood crates And uh, we put the drums in there and and I decided I was going to have a backstage motif And we left the crates on the floor. They were inspected by the los angeles fire marshal Everything was approved and I had my t-shirts hanging over the top of them that said everything else suck on the back Everything was going fine. We're we're having a great show and uh, a gentleman named kevin johnson who was one of the officers of nam um Came by because he had heard complaints Because john and orange county percussion had traveston there They were whacking making all this noise and they kept saying lord It's boom theory with those damn big electric speakers and I'm going no no no We have headphones you can't hear us But the noise police were blaming us and and everybody was blaming us so uh So to make a long story short, which is now impossible kevin comes over And uh, mr. johnson looks at my booth and he points to the um, he points to the t-shirts and he says He goes that's disgusting because it says everything else sucks on the back And I said what's disgusting goes those t-shirts. He goes and those disgusting crates Those should be in the basement and I said no, that's part of my display. I paid. That's cool I said it's it's a backstage vibe because he goes those are not Part of your because those are going out of here. I said no, they're not going out of here I paid for this booth. It was approved by the fire department. Oh, he said that they were fire hazard I said they it was already improved. I've got the stamp from the fire marshal on here. I've got the um I've got the okay from your design panel who came to inspect the booth and he said he said, yeah Well, you know, it's disgusting. I said you want to see disgusting go over the gemini booth I just saw two 10 year old boys looking up the the crack of a woman on a go-go stage wearing a thong You know, you're telling me my booth is disgusting And so this went back and forth for a while and finally he said Those booths or those crates are going in the basement They were taking them out now or or you're out of the show And and he started to call somebody over to take them out and he and I said The first person that steps in my booth to touch my display will spend the rest of the day bleeding and uh And he said that's it. You're out of the show and I turn to uh I turned to the late mark mazuno my vice president and phil weatherill And I said let's pack it up boys And we were actually happy because we had sold out and we were going to go home Go to the or go back to the hotel and watch the super bowl the next day Which means we didn't have to come in sunday So in the history of nam I am the first an only company To have been completely Disassembled and removed from the floor in the history of the show And that's incredible. It is my finest hour. Thank you Man, I so as an outsider. I've actually never been to nam. I didn't realize the amount of like Uh, just what goes into building the display and you have to be approved and all this and that and I get it man I think that sounds cool to have like crates and the backstage vibe and and things shirts hanging on it Sounds like they were just being nitpicky and in a bad mood and you got called out No, the crates were disgusting. They weren't ata cases. They were filthy and gross I just didn't want to put them in the basement because I wanted to be able to load out quickly without having to wait for my crates I know that's awesome. Well Hey, you you lived to to sell another drum another day. So I didn't yeah, man. That's incredible. Well Awesome. Okay. Well, then if anyone's listening then don't do that. That's the lesson we can learn. No, do it Do it get credit cards. You pay for that damn booth. Come on That's awesome. They charge a lot of money for those booths. So I've heard I've heard Yeah, and I love the little bit of orange county info in there as well Because I've had three episodes about the the history of orange county. So that's kind of cool Oh, we blame each other all the time you go down drummer. No, it's the guys at yamaha They're they're making all those because they come by with the decibel meters and it's almost it's I mean, there's no way It's drummer row. I mean you got It's the nature of the beast. You're gonna make noise It is it is incredible. Well All right, Al as we wrap up here. Why don't you tell people where they can find you and I know you have some cool stuff that's in the works. Obviously you said if if the head that you're working on Everything goes to plan it'll change a lot of things So tell us people where they can keep up with you and see what's happening in your website and all that stuff Until I rebuild the website, which is a million years old um boom theory boom theory corp at facebook is where you can find all my goofy stuff once I've rebuilt the website Then we're going to switch over and we'll use the facebook and instagram sites to do nothing but drive traffic to the To the website because I really want to build a community On the website that has nothing to do with social media and social media has its place in the industry, but I I want I want my own website back. Sure. Yeah, and websites are time consuming and Just a whole thing once you start one thing and they're expensive And if you do it yourself on one of the click-and-drag things like I was trying to build I was looking at a portfolio website to kind of put together for some work stuff and it's like Man, you start it. You're two hours in and you're like, I've done nothing I've done. I've written a couple lines of text very time consuming, but Everyone can once that's ready boom theory.com just and also just you can google Boom theory and read a lot of cool things and find find them on social media I will share the links in the description for all that per usual. So Al I think this is awesome, man I'm glad to have you on here because I think you're dare I say a bit I think you're you're I don't want to say an unsung hero because a lot of people know about what you've done But um, I think more people need to know about it. So I'm glad to have you on and help and help share that story I appreciate that. Thank you so much